Democrats at Work Part Deux

Since the original Democrats at Work post has so many comments, I thought I’d add another for fresh commentary on the wickedness of the Democrats. And fellow travelers. Remember, you can’t spell “Democrat” without “rat.”

Reader Interactions

Comments

If you’ll note, as I’ve said, the propaganda from the Right is making Obama out to be the incarnation of evil, when, in fact, he’s not. If anyone in US history is the incarnation of evil it is G H W Bush, with D Cheney a close second. Israel, Israel, Israel, is the paradigm to see all US politics through, and the Right is hardcore Zionist and militarist, whereas the Democrats are not as hardcore (although still Zionist and militarist). Obama is keeping us out of war in Syria and Iran and the Right is furious.

They still think it’s government role to provide healthcare to everyone. I don’t, mostly because that system will never be as good as what we had. Just as with other less damaging laws, Obamacare will not be repealed. It stands for everything liberals stand for. They are fully invested and repealing it will be an admission they were wrong.

It will be decades before people really see. When they see their lives ruled by dogma and not thought. Kind of like life in the Army.

The woman fled from the police not once, but twice. She was stopped for speeding, refused to sign the ticket. In Maine, you can go to jail for refusing to sign.

Not sure what New Mexico state law or department policy says about police shooting at the tires of vehicles. We couldn’t do it where I worked.

I guess the implication is that the police endangered the kids but shooting at the tires of the van, but somehow the mom bears no responsibility for fleeing from a lawful arrest.

I was sued twice while I was a cop. Most cops get sued. Both times were the plaintiffs lied like crazy. Both times they lost. But eventually the lies probably would have won out if I’d stayed 20 years working the street. I should have counter-sued. If I were these cops I’d sue the woman for putting them through so much mental pain, claim I couldn’t sleep for months because of this. The same kind of BS the criminals come up with.

The mother was pulled over for speeding. We don’t know how fast or possibly driving erratically? Her later behavior is certainly erratic. One could argue she posed a danger to her children. When I first saw references to this video on Ace of Spades I think, I wasn’t able to watch it but the description was such that she was simply speeding and then pulled away. The tv news only showed the clip of the cop firing at the car. I like the vid title of “shoot up minivan”, as if he was aerating the vehicle like in some bogus John Kerry speech. Having now seen the whole video, her reaction, her teenage son’s behavior, it’s not so clean cut. None of this would have happened if she and especially her son would have just stayed in the car, taken the ticket, and argued their point in court. That phrase, “just stayed in the car”, has a certain familiar ring to it…hmmm…

Given the recent BS by NM police forcing an enema on a guy, which was completely wrong, I suspect that there’s now an effort to focus as much attention on NM police as possible, especially NM being a border state … One with the word “Mexico” in it.

read the CSM link I posted. She was doing 71 in a 55, got stopped, and issued a ticket. She refused to sign and ran from police twice. People have lost the idea that the cops can use force to arrest them, even for small infractions. They can bust your window out to extract you from your car is such a case. The policeman who shot says he was trying to stop the van by shooting the tire. I wouldn’t have done it and he’ll probably be fired for being stupid.

Note the cop who fired was black, so I guess the race card can’t be played. Pity.

Officer Montoya? Well, black Hispanic soooo…? Also interesting how they cut the video. In your link the officer says that he’s already cutting her a break because her license is expired. Seems suspect right there.

In the early 90s I lived in Santa Fe for 3 years. There was an incident where a guy broke up with his girlfriend and was wandering around outside in his underpants and carrying a steak knife. He was surrounded by 8 cops, and they ended up shooting him dead.

BTW don’t ever speed in New Mexico. There are speed traps everywhere. Even airport security is about twice as ridiculous as everywhere else.

Tom Lujan, who as a Santa Fe police officer in 1993 shot and killed Francisco
“Pancho” Ortega, has killed another man in the line of duty.
Lujan, 28, now a deputy with the Bernalillo County Sheriff’s Department, shot
Mark Owen at Owen’s mobile home in the mountains east of Albuquerque about 11
p.m. Saturday. Owen, according to a spokeswoman for the sheriff’s department,
had been involved in an alcohol-related accident earlier Saturday night.
Sheriff Joe Bowdich has determined that the shooting was justified, his
spokeswoman Ronnie Sparks said Monday. She said the investigation into the
matter is “ongoing” and that her department would forward a report on the
shooting to Albuquerque District Attorney Jeff Romero.
During the investigation six years ago into Lujan’s first line-of-duty
shooting, a storm of controversy erupted in Santa Fe.
On July 3, 1993, Lujan shot and killed Ortega, 28, who was brandishing a
knife while wandering on Hickox and Alicia streets.
Ortega, a man with a history of mental problems, had used the steak knife to
cut himself.
All eight of the officers at the scene reported that Ortega charged Lujan and
another officer before Lujan and another officer fired. A medical investigator
reported that all four shots that hit Ortega were fired by Lujan, who had at
least three previous complaints of excessive force lodged against him.
The shooting sparked a protest march and tension-filled meetings during one,
angry west-side residents confronted the City Council, demanding justice for
Ortega.
A Santa Fe grand jury in 1993 determined that there was not enough evidence
to indict Lujan on criminal charges
But Ortega’s family, which sued the city for wrongful death, won a $505,0000
settlement from the city.

Here on Ft. Drum one of my soldiers was arrested at his home, handcuffed in front of his family and placed in a cell stripped of his shoes and belt. Why? He placed garbage in a dumpster not assigned to his housing area.

My favorite cop book of all time: Night Dogs by Kent Anderson. Anderson is a former Special Forces Sergeant who fought in Vietnam and then went on top serve in the Portland Oregon PD during the 70s.

In the book, one character says that the two most important characteristics of a good cop are compassion and common sense. I tried to keep that in mind the whole time I worked at the PD.

Both. People usually sue the city because it has deep pockets. Check out what happened to the LA PD Officers during the infamous Hollywood Assault Rifle bank robbery. One guy lost a million dollars to the family of one of the robbers; he was in charge of the scene and refused to allow ambulances into the perimeter because he was not sure all of the shooters were accounted for. One shooter bled out and the family sued and won.

Unions are a good thing in that they serve a good purpose in situations such as you were in. I’m a supporter of collective bargaining as a right. The problem I see is that there is very little competition in union representation. Some of this is due, in some unions (teamsters cough, cough), to mob influence. Competitive bidding by different unions would be the ideal, but the practical aspects are likely the rub.

You’re in denial if you think Belgium, capital of Europe(TM), is some paragon of freedom.

Is your objection to laws against speeding or simply the enforcement of such? Yes, we have too many laws. And I’m not too happy with the police lately. But I have more to fear from a meddling, nanny state and one robs me to pay tribute to the ignorant masses than I do of my local po-po.

We’ll be lucky is Belgium hasn’t introduced aspects of Sharia law. It’s already headed that way. Mark Steyn writes about it in America Alone. People laughed of course: It can *never* happen here.

With European birth rates being what they are, and immigration without

When Steyn wrote his book in 2006, half of the leaders in Brussels Parliament (I believe it was the Parliament or some equivalent), were Muslim. And of course, Brussels is the seat of the European Union.

This is real, not just the fantasies of neo-Nazis.

Guys, what we are seeing in many parts of the West including America, is an odd brew of a government that thinks it should be involved and in control of too many aspects of life, but a government at the same time, so wimpy that it cannot stand up to those who vow its destruction. Thus, those inclined to obey the law are the most oppressed.

To a large degree I agree with TJs concern about the NSA, but in fact the NSA is part of our need to get things done without any danger, and it does not get the same results as the best intelligence source: Human sources (HUMINT). As with drones, we can feel we are getting things done without exposing ourselves to danger. Our HUMINT is awful, just dreadful.

What The NSA is up to cannot possibly scare me as to what the academic/journalistic community does to real people on a regular basis. You have to dig and use considerable imagination to feel the damage the NSA has done. Most all of that is reversible given a sane, rational societal environment. But how regularly does sh*t like the Duke 88 occur? Read this reflection on what happened 7 years ago and explain to me why the NSA should chill me more. What substantially has changed?

WTP, the Duke 88 are indeed spineless weasels, but at the end of the day they are completely powerless and nobody really cares what they say or think.

In my view, anger should be focused on the District Attorney’s office. Prosecutors have enormous power and not much accountability, and when they abuse their power as in this case it undermines the whole system. I suspect this is just the tip of the iceburg and DA’s all over the country abuse their authority all the time to the detriment of our justice system.

I don’t know about “completely powerless”. Those kids were put through the wringer, even ones who were not present for the “party”. Their lives disrupted, probably 10’s to 100’s of $K in legal fees. The obviously wrong and guilty Duke 88 continue to teach, publish, etc. Seems any one of them, or any journalist who hyped the story, is far more powerful than either of us combined. Not to mention the Duke University president or the staff at Syracuse who hold significant power over others. Granted, it’s not direct government power but they certainly had influence over the DA.

Lives are disturbed and in some cases ruined by these over-zealous PC types. It’s like a religion with them in their hyper sensitivity and witch hunts, etc. Can you point me the equivalent, concrete damage done by the NSA? And I mean the NSA itself, not any prosecutors and such who, via their own discretion…as you somewhat indicate is the problem above, use the knowledge from the NSA?

Again, I’m not comfortable with some of what the NSA has done, but much of this is more a result of advances in technology rather than nefarious wrong doing. Of course this is a whole other topic for discussion re what marketers do all the time as well and I don’t want to get sidetracked there right now.

Here’s a thought experiment: imagine that activists, concerned with official misconduct, install license-plate readers on private property to track the location of every car belonging to the police department or a politician and upload the locations to a public database. The result: a map of where the police go, and where they don’t—along, perhaps, with politicians’ visits to motels or strip clubs.

Given that police often respond with hostility to simply being videotaped, I expect that a venture like this would prompt an outcry, and probably some efforts to shut it down. But this is precisely what officialdom is doing to citizens.

We now know that federal, state, and local law enforcement agencies are using automated license-plate scanners, mounted on everything from telephone poles to police cars, to build a huge database of where people are driving. This might seem like a small intrusion compared with the electronic spying carried out by the NSA. But not all threats to privacy involve the tracking of emails and other communications.

Right now, the law suggests that license-plate scanners don’t invade your privacy because they record only events that occur in public. After all, anyone could see you driving down the road or parked in front of a motel. But if officials add up enough bits of information like that, they gradually can construct what the ACLU has termed a “single, high-resolution image of our lives.”

There’s a legal term for this idea: the mosaic theory. The New York Times ran a story last year about how a man angrily confronted a Target store manager to complain that the company was sending his teenage daughter coupons for baby goods. Were they trying to encourage her to get pregnant? Nope. Target’s data-mining operation had found a strong correlation between purchases of about 25 items—scent-free lotions, certain nutritional supplements, and so on—and different stages of pregnancy. The teenager’s purchases had fit the pattern. The father apologized to Target a few days later, when it turned out that his daughter was, in fact, pregnant.

Law enforcement agencies may not know or care what toiletries you buy, but they can access credit reports and property tax records, which are public information. Setting that aside, simply tracking our movements can erode our privacy. The Supreme Court recently held that police need a search warrant to attach a GPS tracker to an individual’s car, even though the device would just be recording travel along public roads. The decision turned largely on the idea that placing a locating device on your car is a trespass on your property. But five justices also suggested some sympathy to the mosaic theory as a legal argument; whether the court actually adopts such an approach will have to wait for a later case.

The Supreme Court, though, isn’t the first step in protecting privacy; it’s the last. If people are unhappy with the notion of having their movements, email, Web searches, and other behavior tracked, there’s nothing to stop Congress, or state legislatures, from limiting this sort of activity, both on the part of private businesses and, more significantly, on the part of law enforcement. When it comes to protecting your rights and privacy, there’s no reason to wait for courts to act.

And while we’re at it, maybe we should enable the public to return the surveillance favor. In his prophetic 1998 book, The Transparent Society, David Brin wrote that technology was going to make it almost impossible to stop snooping. But, he suggested, if the government and corporations want to spy on us, they should let the public know what they are doing, too, by letting us track their data. We can set up Web feeds from every police headquarters, for a start. Today, we’re living in Brin’s world, or at least we’re halfway there. Big organizations are already watching individuals—perhaps it’s time to open things up in the other direction.

According to an ACLU report released in July (PDF) on jurisdictions where the technology is already in place, just .005 percent of license plates scanned revealed evidence of a serious crime. Over 99 percent of those scanned had done nothing wrong at all. Yet all that data is still collected and stored. Some jurisdictions have policies requiring police agencies to delete it after a specific amount of time, but the ACLU report also found that many police agencies don’t abide by such guidelines.

Ultimately, that data can then be used in any number of ways. The ACLU report includes a quote from the police department in Scarsdale, New York stating that the use of this technology “is only limited by the officer’s imagination.” He’s right. And you ought to be worried about it.

Reynolds’ piece in Popular Mechanics ends with a call to turn the tables — to use the surveillance state to monitor law enforcement and the government. That of course is already happening with smart phone cameras, although law enforcement officials are doing everything they can to stop it — just read the blog of photographer and activist Carlos Miller for a few days. When a federal judge suggested that NYPD officers wear cameras mounted on their uniforms, surveillance state champion Mayor Michael Bloomberg perversely declared the idea a violation of police officers’ civil rights — a statement that as well as any other illustrates Bloomberg’s twisted concept of the proper relationship between the government and the governed. When I interviewed Jim Pasco, executive director of the Fraternal Order of Police in 2010, he expressed a similar sentiment: “Police officers don’t check their civil rights at the station house door.”

Most recently, police groups in Boston are protesting a proposal to put GPS devices on squad cars. It seems that police don’t want the public to know where they are, even while they’re on the job, getting paid by taxpayers, driving a car provided by taxpayers.

The watchers keep coming with new and innovative ways to watch us. But they sure as hell don’t want to be watched themselves.

Yes, I realize this. But I also have come to realize how well documented all of this is. I myself bought into the arguments, at some level, posed by the anti-anti-Communists, because I never really studied it and I tend to avoid things that reek of conspiracy. But now, the evidence is overwhelming as to what really happened and how it continues to affect America 60 years later. The Soviet archives have been opened and things like the Venona Papers match up with the things that McCarthy and Whittaker Chambers said. The people who defected tell it like it is, was, too.

The Venona Papers show there were approximately 450 Soviet agents in America during those times, many of them in high level government positions. Fact: Every single person McCarthy accused of being a Communist, was in fact a Communist.

I am not infected by Red Fever. What I find fascinating is that something like this could work. The Communists controlled half the world at one point. Their methods were incredibly cunning and they were tireless. They did the opposite of what we consider a revolution, because they did not start with the grass roots, they start with society’s elites, its academics, its political figures. They attacked the social institutions that keep a society together and resistant to Communism: religion, family, every classic value was intentionally attacked, picked out as a target. The ACLU was one way the Communists changed America. It was founded by Communists.

Yeah, I suspect there’s a few KGB, possibly even Putin, kicking themselves that if they just held out a little longer…But either way socialism is always destined to fail relative to freer societies. If you can contain them, the socialists eventually run out of other people’s money. As I may have related here before, spoke with a West German fighter pilot who got into intelligence services near the end of the cold war. He debriefed many of the East German pilots after the wall came down and learned that they were getting something like less than 1 hour of flight time a month. They would have been cannon fodder for West German and American pilots.

Sorry, meant to post another video from this series. In another video Bezmenov states that the Soviet strategy was to replace natural social orders and connections that people have (family, friends etc) and replace them with bureaucratic entities, like social workers. This was initiated with a paycheck from the government. This was the hook.

This reminds me of the legend of Kung Fu Dim Yak. A Dim Yak expert could supposedly strike you, and you may die a month later. We’re dying decades later.

Wait…Dim Yak is fake?!?!?!?! But I saw that in an episode of Quincy back in the 70’s. And Tarantino used it in Kill Bill (or so I’m told). And the internet tells me it was used in a Dan Brown novel. Makes you wonder who you can trust anymore.

He was found not guilty. The system worked at some level. The problem is showing this is any more prevalent than it ever was. You should have heard the stories from the old-timers at my PD on how things got done in the 70s.

I knew an old Chicago cop from the 30’s & 40’s. As a kid he saw Al Capone throw money, pocket change, to the children as he went into court. He had slab pictures of dead mobsters. And he had some stories that he told my father that my father related second hand. I suspect that dad and he shared a certain level of understanding of how nasty the real world is, between Dad’s WWII experiences and our neighbor’s work as a beat cop fighting the mob in Chicago.

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) has filed a lawsuit that, if true, would stand as one of the most grotesque and vicious cases of police abuse in recent memory. Marlene Tapia says that she was arrested and forced to strip naked for a contraband examination. The officers at the Metropolitan Detention Center (Bernalillo County New Mexico) claimed that she had a plastic baggie in her vagina and, according to the lawsuit, forced her to bend over and as punishment sprayed mace inside of her vagina.

The lawsuit identifies the officer who sprayed the mace as Blanca Zapater and said that she sprayed the mace twice.

Peter Simonson, the Executive Director of ACLU of New Mexico has publicly denounced the actions for its “maliciousness.” The woman was in pain for weeks.

Reports say that the officer who sprayed the mace has been “disciplined” but what does that mean? If this is true, why would the officer not be fired and criminally charged?

We have obviously not heard the side of the police in the case, but the ACLU is not known to file frivolous lawsuits.

If the allegations are true, this would constitute a form of torture. It would raise serious questions not only about the potential criminal charges for the officer but the terminations of supervisors who felt that this was a mere matter for “discipline” rather than termination. If discipline was ordered, it would appear to confirm that the mace was not used for self-protection. If so, why was it used?

As stated, we have yet to hear the police side of the story. You will also note that I express contempt above for the NM police who forced an enema, basically anal rape, on a drug suspect. But even in that instance the full story that later came out wasn’t entirely as originally presented.

Also, We have obviously not heard the side of the police in the case, but the ACLU is not known to file frivolous lawsuits. I’m not so convinced of the latter part of this statement. The ACLU has shown considerable leftist influence. I gave up on them back in the 70’s when the son of Soviet diplomats or some such attempted to defect and the ACLU, which is forever taking sides protecting the rights of children against their evil parents or our evil oppressive school systems, took the side of the parents/Soviets.

And again just like the NSA, I see the academic/journalism front a far greater threat to our society. The police are moving up to a close second. But still looking for justification to fear the NSA as opposed to the people behind the Duke 88, the Bush/Rather/Mapes story, the Zimmerman lynching, the PC BS witch hunts on college and public school campuses, etc. etc. etc.

WTP, I agree that there is a serious lack of intellectual diversity in academia. However, I don’t understand how an English professor can be a greater threat than an out of control cop, or even worse, an out of control DA.

Who inspired the out of control DA? Where did he get the idea that in spite of the evidence (or lack thereof) before him, a bunch of white lacrosse boys from an elite school simply must be racist rapists?

The ACLU picks its cases to match its politics. It was founded by true Communists in the 20s. It maintains its fight against classical American values.

The ACLU…

“The ACLU was founded in 1920 by an agnostic named Roger Baldwin who said, “I am for socialism, disarmament and ultimately for abolishing the state itself. … communism is the goal” (1992 Policy Guide of the ACLU). Baldwin’s family was Unitarian and rejected the deity of Christ”

The ACLU pretends to be a great defender of freedom, but it actually works very hard to eliminate our freedoms. It’s against the freedom of parents to pass their values on to their children; it’s against the freedom of the Boy Scouts to set standard rules of conduct for their leaders; and it’s against the freedom of churches to proclaim the uncensored Word of God – the freedoms our forefathers died for. The ACLU is pro-abortion, pro-porn, pro-child porn, pro-polygamy and anti-Christmas.

I’d fire the cops simply for being fat @$$es, and yes this seems to be a problem. But otoh, how often do people in police custody try to harm themselves so they can later claim police brutality? Surely Magus knows. I would also argue that the taser was doing less harm than what the man was doing to himself. AGAIN, not condoning the behavior but I don’t see this as a severe case. These onesy-twosey incidents, IMO, pale in comparison to the damage of the PC mentality, etc. that is ingrained into our society literally millions of times a day by leftist educators and biased-but-presented-as-neutral journalists. From the all-fighting-is-wrong mentality that has given rise to the current bullying problems, to the open-classroom idiotic concept of the 70’s, to the racism-is-everywhere mentality, the problems with a significant portion of the ACLU (see Magus above)…I could go on and on and sometimes do…

There are many things that bother me about the PC mentality. Here are 3:

1) They believe that some people should be accorded special rights because they belong to certain favored groups. I think everyone should have the same rights.

2) They believe that is OK to shout down speech that they don’t agree with. I don’t believe in suppressing speech.

3) They are always very quick to claim that anyone who disagrees with them must be motivated by racism. How can you possibly have a reasoned debate and reach an agreement with someone who believes you are a racist?

The primary message of Orwell’s 1984 is that political correctness is the aim of all totalitarian regimes. Orwell was trying to make the point that while intellectuals like to believe themselves above it all, they are in fact incredibly conformist, craven and will believe almost anything.

As Yuri Bezmenov states in the video series I posted, the Communist Party wanted to change the very essence of thought in America. They did this in part by making certain types of thought and speech unthinkable. It does not even enter in to many peoples’ minds to think a certain way. As he states, when the objective is achieved, you can show the people all the facts in the world, but they will not see the truth. Not until they are lined up against the wall and gunned down.

Thank you. And perhaps this is why I am less sensitive to some of the issues you write about. This story does not shock me, but I know it is bad. I see things like this daily. But there is little media focus on how poorly soldiers are treated.

Sheesh…It’s like Captain Queeg and the strawberries or Jimmy Cagnie and the palm tree villain.

OK, boys…so I’m of two minds here. On the one hand, as a lifetime civilian I’m a bit uneasy with having a say. But OTOH, I can’t help channeling my old man. Seems obvious to me the situation is got out of hand and thus the mixed messages up the command chain. And as the one wife said, who signed for the stuff in the first place.

Yet, OTOH, and I see Magus you have replied before I finished this and you understand deployment and having a family, as army life goes there are worse stupidities. Something inspired the Caine Mutiny and Mr. Roberts.

But this is what happens when people have limited choices and doubly so when so much of their personal lives are under the control of a central command structure.

On the whole, I agree whoever the CO driving this situation, especially any other leader who had direct responsibility for the goods that went missing on both the sending and receiving sides, needs some serious adjustment in his leadership training. Seems the sort of thing you should get busted a rank or two for, but as I say I’m a lifetime civi, so grain of salt…

One problem I have with the decision, is what did the CO hope to gain from it? I mean, are they searching the quarters of all the soldiers before they are released? No.

I agree with your assessments about central command. I make this point often, trying in vain to remind the officers that NCO are supposed to have more power in the US Army at the small unit level than any NCO in the world. Im not so sure, however.

My feeling is that these are guys who are back from deployment and should be getting a little R & R and quality time with their families. To bust their chops over some missing bayonets and scopes is way out of line.

I didnt understand your Captain Queeg reference. I have the Cain Mutiny in my kindle but have never read it. I watched the movie clip about the lost strawberries. Really, there are many instances in the Army that I could relate that are just like this.

With the outbreak of World War II, Pine Camp was selected for a major expansion. An additional 75,000 acres (304 km²) of land was purchased, displacing 525 local families. Five entire villages were eliminated, while others were reduced from one-third to one-half their size.

The land was purchased and the families were forced to move due to the war. I have no problem with this.

Don’t get me started on Kelo, however. From Wikipedia:

Kelo v. City of New London, 545 U.S. 469 (2005)[1] was a case decided by the Supreme Court of the United States involving the use of eminent domain to transfer land from one private owner to another private owner to further economic development. In a 5–4 decision, the Court held that the general benefits a community enjoyed from economic growth qualified private redevelopment plans as a permissible “public use” under the Takings Clause of the Fifth Amendment.

Maybe it’s just the booze, the fire log, and the chilly FL weather of 50 F, but happy Thanksgiving to Democrats, socialists, and Mike, AJ, TJ, Magus, Nal, FRE, and anybody else I might have missed. F’n sentimentalism will one day be the death of me…if the booze don’t get me first…;)

Yes, I agree with all. And can we agree that all of these are less so than they were, say, in 1930? But the feminists and other leftists would say that they don’t like the exact nature of of the decision-making process from that time.

I argue, that during that time, there was little confusion as to what a husband’s or wife’s responsibilities were.

Yes, clearly the “traditional” marriage of the 1930s was to some extent successful. However, lots of people were trapped in unhappy marriages. Also, I suspect that many “traditional” marriages were more egalitarian in practice than the couple let on in public.

Depends on the specific marriage. It should be, in the sense that decisions relating to the marriage should be made by both people. In many cases, one person will tend to handle the decisions in one area-which is fine as long as this is agreed upon.

So it is a democracy. It must be agreed upon….There seems to be no dispute resolution system now, as there was in the past. I work for the Stability Operations Information Center, in my first deployment to Afghanistan. One of the fundamental aspects of stability and peace in a nation is a system for dispute resolution. My premise is that our modern marriages have no way to resolve disputes, since both parties have equal say. Why doesn’t the army work like this? Would that work?

Discussion would presumably be the dispute resolution system for a marriage. But, I’m divorced, so my understanding of how to make a marriage work has been shown to be lacking.

I don’t think the problem couples face is the equal say problem. They seem to fail for other reasons, like money problems.

The army would not work with an equal say for everyone primarily because of combat-to fight effectively as a unit, there must either be great teamwork in which everyone understands what needs to be done and does it or a leader who can make that happen. I suppose that if a married couple faces a life and death situation, then it would make sense for the most competent partner to take over to save them both. But in day to day life, democracy seems to be the most sensible option between people who are supposed to be equal in status.

Of course, one could use the Socratic argument about decision making based on expertise. That is, the partner who is the expert and knows what is right to do should make the decision on the grounds that s/he will most likely make the best decision. This argument also counts against democracy as a political system.

The practical problem is determining who has the better decision making capacity in the specific area.

Patriarchy, like every civilization in the history of the world before 40 years ago. The husband should be enlightened but the final arbiter on matters in contest. Part of that enlightenment would include the acknowledgement of expertise in certain areas by the wife. The husband would have power, but ultimately be responsible for bad choices. The two can have equal status but different roles. Two cars approaching each other in the same lane leads to a crash.

But history shows women have severe problems with money and spending, even many women admit this. And since money is a huge problem in many modern marriages, this seems important. In my opinion, women and men are not the same in their decision making processes.

I realize of course that my view is not popular, even among “conservatives”. In this regard I’m rightly termed a reactionary. But a rather excellent study shows that women’s suffrage resulted in massive increased in government. Give a woman the opportunity to spend, and she likely will. Money and spending are to women what sex is to men.

And I can see that some don’t like my idea. For them I can say that perhaps the women would have stayed back on the Titanic, while the men populated the life boats? I doubt it. Women have been pampered even in the most conservative western societies. The moment they meet true equality they recoil and cry foul.

So until your proposed egalitarianism can sing along with the men on their way to open Davey Jones’ Locker….

“Eternal Father, strong to save,
Whose arm hath bound the restless wave,
Who bidd’st the mighty ocean deep
Its own appointed limits keep;
Oh, hear us when we cry to Thee,
For those in peril on the sea!”

…I think my system is better than yours. I also say that you should consider Augustine’s maxim: “Peace flows from order”, and ask yourself what order the modern female nag has brought to the family structure.

If you mean that in the sense that the parents’ focus is on acquiring attention for themselves to sell a book by exploiting, and possibly even “inspiring” themselves, the quirks of a small child, thus enabling themselves to consume and acquire material goods, then yes. But I suspect Mike is regurgitating standard Po-Mo BS as such is expected by the culture of academia. It’s how they get the meager resources they can swindle to enable them to consume and acquire material goods.

When were those halcyon days when people turned up their noses at consumption and acquisition of material goods, again? Ah, yes…they were back in the day when there was little innovation because the elites, be they the royaly or the priesthood, taxed the commoners so that the said elites could consume and acquire material goods while convincing the masses that consumption and acquisition of material goods just wasn’t good for them. Thus there was little excess resources for said masses to invest in themselves and create wealth for themselves, thus reducing demand for consumption and acquisition of material goods. Thomas Malthus Uber Alles.

I agree that people have always pursued material goods. But can you imagine your father scrambling after a Cabbage Patch Kid like these people? As you’ve described your father, and as a vet of WWII, I’m sure he understood the things that were really important, unlike the spoiled masses that now only know how to take and complain.

These types remind me of a scene in a book called The Last Centurion, in which a character relates a scene he saw on CNN after hurricane Katrina: A fat woman was wading through a pool of water, yelling and screaming at the camera about the government. Meanwhile, a skinny black guy is directing people to areas where people can get safe and get food. Guess which person the media focused on?

These people are the same types that want the government to intervene if their cable goes out after they fail to pay the bill. They need the boot.

Oh, without a doubt. We used to shake our heads at those annual news stories about Black Friday. Now I have no way of knowing this, but as you suggest, I would suspect those going ape-sh*t on Black Friday are mostly the minions of the left. I don’t see many doctors, engineers, bankers, etc. in those mobs. We as kids didn’t get everything we wanted for Christmas. That was just the way it was. He’ll, we didn’t have cable tv or Odessy 2000. You got what you got and there was no whining about other people having more. Someone always will have more than you and others will have less. You help those with less and make yourself useful to those with more. People who lived through the real Depression, like many of my aunts and cousins still living, scoff at all this whining and philosophical BS trying to paint the good times as bad and the bad times as good. Only fools would turn it all upside down. Fools who never new the REAL bad times.

But where is the idea of human dignity going? I see the food lines in the Great Depression photos and most of the men have suits on, tattered though they may be. The Occupy Wallstreet types have no dignity, laying in a street like dogs. Neither do people crawling over each other for trinkets.

See, I don’t buy the “times change” bit. We KNOW dignity when we see it. Those men had dignity. They couldn’t wait to find a job and get out of that line. They hated standing in that line. Dignity can be had at the lowest level, the guy who pumps gas, the woman who serves coffee.

Dignity definition:

:a way of appearing or behaving that suggests seriousness and self-control

: the quality of being worthy of honor or respect

We know it when we see it, and we know what is not dignifying to humans. It doesn’t even really have to do with different cultures that much. A half-naked Aztec warrior in a painting can be dignified. Now, if a Westerner tries to shock by dressing half-naked, we think them undignified.

I’m not hopeful about our future. I’ve gone through a TS Eliot transformation, and I think I have more reasons to worry than he did. I don’t like the way Mike blows it all off as mere passing fancies that have always happened. They haven’t always happened. People have not always been as idiotic in America as they now are.

Human dignity comes and goes. I think you’re seeing a romantic picture of those food lines. While many of those men had dignity, many did not. People fell into alcohol and opium and other addictions. The Volstead Act gave rise to a criminal class of bootleggers and worse. When the Depression hit, many people who were living beyond their means or were living on the excesses of a post-Great War economy had to adjust, get some dignity or die. A lot of people died. Those who did not let it kill them were made stronger. As well with the war that followed. The Nazis and the Japanese thought we had a very decadent society, what with our boozing (prohibition or not), jazz music, etc. They took us as weak and thus a paper tiger. I think you can find parallels to the lead up to WWI as well.

I think the basic difference is that in the past, our society expected people to behave in a more dignified manner. These days we make excuses for destructive behavior. We blame everyone but the individual who fails to respect themselves.

Just watched the Grinch for the umpteenth time. What I take from that story is that while the Whos understand the true meaning of Christmas is more than just the stuff, the Grinch still returns all their stuff so they can have a traditional Christmas. The stuff doesn’t make Christmas, but it doesn’t take away from it either. What I see when the usual anti-stuff crowd comes out of the woodwork every year now, is a group of people who only see the stuff. They are cynics who, as Oscar Wilde – quite the cynic himself, know the cost of everything and the value of nothing.

I also see the problems evident in these videos as all interconnected. Some don’t seem to see the same thing. The same blanketing mindset in involved or influenced all of it. Even though they depict people of different backgrounds and tendencies.

Yes, and how did that focus come about? You and I have different ideas on the roots of that. Materialism has its roots in meaninglessness. An entire generation taught that they need revolution because some have more than they do. Communism=Materialism. The entire Leftist worldview is based on materialism. We’re assured that crime is caused by poverty. Dialectical materialism….Most “capitalists” are simply doing what free people do; buying and selling to and from people they choose. Unlike Marx’s view of a business man, profit is not the end all, be all.

And this has been my argument on everything in regards to your articles on giving more free stuff: I’m not about making money at all costs. I believe in things greater and beyond myself. But I know what the Left is about, it’s about denying things beyond materialism, mocking tradition, mocking a deeper meaning to life itself. It’s about envy and destroying what it. And so this is the result.

I don’t either, but I must admit that I saw the cleverness in some of the thinking put int to the questions. And I would have guessed that you and I would have scored higher than TJ.

An issue here, is where one thinks force should be employed to change aspects of society, Homosexuality for instance. I have no desire to employ force to change the behavior, but I think it’s harmful to the individual and society. I also think it’s purported cause and psychological roots are a lie. Gay parades are an assault on dignity, not a real fight for freedom. They already have freedom. They want to dominate by shocking us into submission, not merely be free.

Personally, I think homosexuality is just the way some people are. While I understand why society has issues with it, from what I have seen for many gay people that is just who they are. OTOH, the glorification of the lifestyle beyond simple acceptance is a problem. And forcing such an attitude on people of more conservative values is no better than forcing heterosexuality on people who are by nature, gay. Shutting down city streets for gay pride parades is nearly as ridiculous as shutting them down for ginger-pride or Italian pride or any number of ethnic-specific celebrations. Being proud of who you are does not require you to force yourself on others. And the excesses involved in many of these celebrations are nothing more than an in-your-face assault on the very society that they expect to accept them for who they are. Seems very counter-productive unless they are really designed to inflame rather than enlighten. I suspect the latter.

Also, in regard to “who they are”, I do feel there are many people who are not naturally gay but do adapt the behavior either out of jaded sexuality (Mick Jagger/David Bowie types) or simply for attention (many lesbians seem to fit this category). I believe human sexuality is far more complex than what has been considered the norm in the past but discussion of it, from both extremes, and lacks the acknowledgment that there is much that cannot be understood with what we now know. Not just in regard to one human to another, but also the complexities of an open tolerance of homosexuality means to a society over several generations. Such would be an interesting thing for philosophers to explore, but they’re too busy selling socialism and their secular religion to be bothered.

I knew a girl once who I think preferred guys but became gay after spending time in jail. She had a hard edge and just wasn’t very attractive to guys. In her case I think it was a choice to either have gay sex or no sex at all.

And how easily do humans fool themselves? She could fool herself, I believe, in to believing it was the way she was born, if only to protect her ego. It’s not just about sex, but the desire to be wanted.

My sister is a lesbian. She is pretty, and extremely intelligent (earned the Joshua Chamberlain scholarship in high school and attended an elite college). She outed herself at Bowdoin College, an extremely liberal college where it was actually encouraged. As with myself, our father was relatively absent from her life. As with my father and myself, she has a very sensitive and artistic personality, and I believe those types of personalities can easily get pulled in directions that aren’t good for them.

Well, as I was alluding to above, I think women can cross that boundary more easily for numerous reasons. I believe beauty is even more alluring to women than it is to men and if you look at historic and, going much further back, biological norms, multiple women competing for a single man, harems, polygamy, etc. it’s not all that surprising.

I read an article quite a few years back that suggested the hyper sexuality we see in the entertainment media and in advertising, a sexuality aimed at men but thus featuring women, attributed to a rise in lesbianism and/or bisexuality predominating on the female side. Not just in the acceptance of such, but in causation. And not just at a conscious level but subconsciously as well. Don’t recall the specifics or where I read it but it was a rather compelling case.

Also meant to add in the original reply that sidetracked us onto gay issues…I believe, as is repeated ad nausium by shrinks…not that they can’t be right once in a while, that many men are suppressing gay tendencies. I had a roommate twenty years ago or so, and ex-football player, who spent waaaay too much time on his personal appearance and neatness, over compensated on the physical side by picking unnecessary fights with strangers, and, while he had a very attractive, intelligent girlfriend attending college 2 hours away, would bring home the skankiest old hags on occasion. Like he had to prove to himself he was straight by having to bring something, anything home. Now that I think of it, he still owes me 20 bucks for an unpaid utility bill. The b*stard.

Very few of my answers would have been influenced by “greatest freedom” unless you consider those in regard to children or youth. Granting children unfettered freedom is likely to result in they’re having fewer freedoms as adults, but YMMV I suppose. As for Jeff. “grant a handful of your slaves freedom in your will” was not one of the questions. Not big on watering trees with the blood of tyrants either.

And more hoaxes. You can’t make this stuff up…well apparently you can…

Tirado’s republished confessional in The Huffington Post received more than 4 million views and was featured by MSNBC host Touré. He was clearly moved by the plight of this woman.

“Poverty is sticky,” the MSNBC host opined. “It clings to you, leaves physical markers on the body.” He singled out a portion of Tirado’s essay that was particularly sympathetic.

I have missing teeth and skin that looks like it will when you live on b12 and coffee, and nicotine, and no sleep. Beauty is a thing you get when you can afford it and that’s how you get the job you need in order to be beautiful.
“When so much politics is about battling over whether to give one more crumb to the poor or give them none, we are going in the wrong direction,” Touré asserted.

But an investigation into Tirado’s background by the Houston Press’ Angelica Leicht revealed that the blog post’s author is a private-school-educated Democratic activist who wildly exaggerated her circumstances. She owns a home as the result of her parent’s generosity. She has worked in politics since 2004 and has called herself a private political consultant since 2010.

She’s married to a Marine, has met President [Barack] Obama while interning for a politician (who obviously wasn’t disgusted by those rotten teeth), and has plenty of time to visit Las Vegas on vacation. And blog about her privileged life on WordPress.
She speaks both German and Dutch, and has a well-rounded political blog that ended in 2011. It’s also a blog where she quite plainly references being paid to win races.

It says a lot that people don’t want to pretend to be rich, they want to pretend to be poor. I remember when I was in school, I was too ashamed to go to the front of the class when they asked who needed free lunch certificates. It’s called dignity. Liberals should try a dose of it.

DENVER, Oct. 28, 2013 /PRNewswire/ — Sweden has become the first western nation to recommend a lower-carbohydrate higher-fat, diet – in alignment with the Atkins™ approach to eating – as part of an effort to reduce the national prevalence of obesity, diabetes, and to improve markers of heart health. This bold move stems from a literature review of 16,000 studies on diet and obesity, published by Swedish government advisors at the Council on Health Technology Assessment. This published report was released by the Council in September and the Swedish government announcement followed shortly thereafter.[1]

Swedish advisors recognize that the oft-recommended low-fat diet is failing in the fight to stop or reverse obesity trends that have reached epidemic proportions across the globe. The Swedes will now pursue this lower-carbohydrate, higher-fat approach citing the many potential benefits it may offer: reducing body weight, lowering blood sugar and improving good cholesterol. Essentially, the Council suggests that a diet moderately-low in carbohydrate (40% of total calories) would see some of these improvements and a greater increase in good (HDL) cholesterol without having any adverse effects on bad (LDL) cholesterol, while an even lower carbohydrate intake (20% of total calories) would result in more benefits including improved blood sugar levels for individuals with obesity and diabetes and marginally decreased levels of triglycerides.

The ideologues cannot fight reality forever. The science is becoming overwhelming. Anyone with blood sugar or weight problems will almost assuredly gain great benefits from keeping carbohydrates to under 100 grams a day. I’ve never seen it not work with the troops I’ve trained.

Not that I disagree with the anti-carb theory, but there’s a big genetic factor involved here. What is good for Swedes may not be as good for Celts or Hispanics or sub-Saharan Africans or various mixtures of races. Such caveat would also apply in regard to the traditional diet of that culture.

Next to go–Man-made global warming and its supposed apocalyptic ending.

“And the media play along. For example, it somehow wasn’t front-page news that committed believers in man-made global warming recently admitted there’s been no surface global warming for well over a decade and maybe none for decades more. Nor did we see warmists conceding that their explanation is essentially a confession that the previous warming may not have been man-made at all.
That admission came in a new paper by prominent warmists in the peer-reviewed journal Climate Dynamics. They not only conceded that average global surface temperatures stopped warming a full 15 years ago, but that this “pause” could extend into the 2030s.
Mind you, the term “pause” is misleading in the extreme: Unless and until it resumes again, it’s just a “stop.” You don’t say a bullet-ridden body “paused” breathing.”

I suppose there is some merit to looking at the (allegedly) natural diet of humans and determining whether or not that is a better diet for humans. Of course, what animals eat in the wild is not always what is best for them-it is just what they can locate and acquire.

But, the marketing is clever and the usual crowd of fad diet folks are embracing their inner whatever.

So, TJ…still think the NSA is a greater threat to your pursuit of happiness than the typical university staff/faculty?
So Mr. Strange got his day in court and was treated fairly. But he had already been punished for the unproven crimes. Auburn expelled him after a campus tribunal found him “responsible” for committing the catchall offense of “sexual assault and/or sexual harassment.” A letter from Melvin Owens, head of the campus police, explained that expulsion is a life sentence. If Mr. Strange ever sets foot on Auburn property, he will be “arrested for Criminal Trespass Third,” Mr. Owens warned.

Cop out. Universities kick and scream when the rights of faculty or staff are abused in manners far less threatening than this. And while the up-front investigation may be forced upon the university, if they had any sense of decency and self-respect they would honor the findings of a true court of law and challenge the feds to contradict what a court has decided. After being found innocent there is no justification for expulsion, let alone a life-time ban from Auburn property. I doubt actual criminals face such.

And further more, can you name me a college campus from which terrorist bomber Bill Ayers has been banned? I suppose there might be one or two, but for the most part? Of course he was never convicted of anything either. Though he did admit to planting a bomb in the Pentagon and other activities.

#All worthy of criticism and mockery. But the problem of the universities can be easily fixed if the Republicans would grow some cojones and start tying federal funding to thinks like allowing ROTC to recruit on campus, etc.

And how are those Republicans going to keep getting elected if the general voting population is so heavily influenced by an academea and media that will demonize them for doing so? Witness our very host’s attitudes, opinions, and selective silence in regard to these stories and his attitude to Republicans with balls to object to what is going on? He educates a couple hundred students a year. Students many of whom are already steeped in a culture leaning significantly left.

Again with the hand wave. The point is WHAT are they teaching and how truly open are they to discussions from students. In my university days I had a statistics professor who was dead wrong about the Monty Hall problem (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monty_Hall_problem). This was math. It was repeatable, verifiable, etc. Yet he refused to yield to the few underling students who tried to point out to him what he didn’t understand.

As many of FIRE’s (and other college classroom) videos show, there is significant amount of intolerance, intimidation, and indoctrination that goes on either overtly, as seen in videos, or more subtly, in the more ethereal subjects. THIS is the problem.

The part about the Harvard president getting tossed for suggesting women may not be as scientifically inclined as men says it all. If this stuff ever comes to my doorstep, I’ll renounce my citizenship, I’ll make sure I go to jail.

That Harvard president was Lawerence Summers. Former treasury secretary under Clinton, he had Democrat credibility and a fair amount of Republican support. He was the leading candidate for the next Federal Reserve Chairman but was pushed aside in favor of the new heir apparent Janet Yellen, who would be (and thus simply must be) the first woman to occupy that position. She is a solid Keynesian thus her position on monetary policy is considerably to the left. Summers withdrew his candidacy stating “I have reluctantly concluded that any possible confirmation process for me would be acrimonious and would not serve the interest of the Federal Reserve, the Administration or, ultimately, the interests of the nation’s ongoing economic recovery.”

I do agree that we are less free than we have ever been, and I am concerned with some of the NSA’s activity. My biggest concern has to do with the laws passed to ensure political correctness and those that enable the government to arrest you for what are historically very minor incidents. Plus, of course, the vice of government regulation and taxes on business combines with the moral and social decay of our population.

Since I work in the S2 section and handle aspects of security for my battalion, I get to see the blotter which shows what people are arrested for. Yesterday, I saw that a soldier got arrested for having a domestic argument with his wife in front of the children. One of my soldiers was arrested out of his home because he put garbage from his house in a dumpster assigned to another building complex other than his own. My former OIC, a Captain, was arrested last year for driving with an outstanding fine that he had no way of knowing he owed, since the bill was sent to his home of record, and he being in the military did not get.

The army has now instituted “courtesy patrols” inside the commissary and PX and other areas on various bases in which soldiers walk around noting and correcting soldiers who commit minor regulation infractions, such as walking while talking on cell phones, and putting hands in pockets. They are also going after spouses for “wearing slutty clothes”. So the army created an internal police force to spy on soldiers who break rules that have no moral force at all. I have no moral qualms about hands in pockets, though I have always avoided it, even in my police days when it was not against the rules.

This stuff has really been bothering me since I returned from deployment. Am I not a free man? Mike has stated that free countries like America should not take hard line security measures against groups like al-Qaeda since this violates the very freedom we represent. Why must people in the army be less free than the people they protect?

Oh, I could relate a few stories about diversity in the corporate world. The short form…had a Hungarian and a Russian coworkers on our team. Both got out of their respective countries before the wall came down. Rumor had it the Russian guy, who had been (I think) a major in their missile development program. As our boss was instructing us on yet another diversity training class we would need to attend and to what it would entail, the Russian looked at the Hungarian guy, smiled,and said “Just like old times, eh?”.

“Within 2 hours and 15 minutes of initially being contacted by MRFF, the nativity scene had been promptly removed,” Loebe’s statement read. “MRFF wants to congratulate the Air Force on acting so swiftly to reverse this egregious violation and hopes that in the future they will ensure that no such violations continue to occur.”

Phyllis May of Redmond, Wash. says she is “appalled and shocked and embarrassed all at the same time” about the incident that happened on Dec. 3.

May has a small business selling unique sock monkey dolls. She says she and her husband were on their way from St. Louis to Sea-Tac and she had a couple of monkeys and sewing supplies with her in a carry-on bag.

“His pistol was in there,” she says of the sock monkey “Rooster Monkburn,” a take-off on John Wayne character “Rooster Cogburn” from the film “True Grit.”

May and her husband were going through the screening process when she noticed that one of her bags was missing.

“And the (TSA agent) held it up and said ‘whose is this?’” she said. “I realized oh, my God this is my bag.”

May said the TSA agent went through the bag, through the sewing supplies and found the two-inch long pistol.

“She said ‘this is a gun,’” said May. “I said no, it’s not a gun it’s a prop for my monkey.”

“She said ‘If I held it up to your neck, you wouldn’t know if it was real or not,’ and I said ‘really?’” said May.

The TSA agent told May she would have to confiscate the tiny gun and was supposed to call the police.

“I said well go ahead,” said May. “And I said really? You’re kidding me right, and she said no it looks like a gun.”

“She took my monkey’s gun,” said May, who has retained her sense of humor.

“Rooster Monkburn has been disarmed so I’m sure everyone on the plane was safe,” she said. “I understand she was doing her job but at some point doesn’t common sense prevail?”

You know, they used to say if, as a white person, if you’re walking down the street and cross to the other side upon encountering a black or group of black people, you were racist. Wonder what a philosopher would say about such behavior.

As for the spanking, highly unlikely either way. This screams fatherless-family. No responsible man would tolerate such behavior in their son.

After the next inevitable apocalypse, men will be desperately needed again! Oh, sure, there will be the odd gun-toting Amazonian survivalist gal, who can rustle game out of the bush and feed her flock, but most women and children will be expecting men to scrounge for food and water and to defend the home turf. Indeed, men are absolutely indispensable right now, invisible as it is to most feminists, who seem blind to the infrastructure that makes their own work lives possible. It is overwhelmingly men who do the dirty, dangerous work of building roads, pouring concrete, laying bricks, tarring roofs, hanging electric wires, excavating natural gas and sewage lines, cutting and clearing trees, and bulldozing the landscape for housing developments. It is men who heft and weld the giant steel beams that frame our office buildings, and it is men who do the hair-raising work of insetting and sealing the finely tempered plate-glass windows of skyscrapers 50 stories tall.

Every day along the Delaware River in Philadelphia, one can watch the passage of vast oil tankers and towering cargo ships arriving from all over the world. These stately colossi are loaded, steered, and off-loaded by men. The modern economy, with its vast production and distribution network, is a male epic, in which women have found a productive role—but women were not its author. Surely, modern women are strong enough now to give credit where credit is due!

I just engaged in some flame wars on Time’s comment log. In particular, with a person named Jaimie, whom as far as I can tell, is a transsexual that hated men so much he/she became a women. He/she is spewing all the normal leftist feminist propaganda, and perhaps even a bit more. Such people must be ruthlessly put in their places.

Don’t know if this is Democrats At Work or Hyperbole…I know if GOPers predicted such, it would be “hyperbole”, but as this has manifested in reality, it’s simply Democrats At Work…I suppose I’m cool then…
The Democratic research group American Bridge apologized on Monday for following Sen. Kelly Ayotte (R-N.H.) at a memorial service over the weekend.The organization, dedicated to digging up opposition research on GOP candidates, said the mistake happened after a miscommunication and it does not usually attend those types of events.

DC District Judge Ellen Segal Huvelle yesterday ordered the Obama Administration to release a copy of an unclassified presidential directive, and she said the attempt to withhold it represented an improper exercise of “secret law.”

The Obama White House has a “limitless” view of its authority to withhold presidential communications from the public, she wrote, but that view is wrong.

“The government appears to adopt the cavalier attitude that the President should be permitted to convey orders throughout the Executive Branch without public oversight– to engage in what is in effect governance by ‘secret law’,” Judge Huvelle wrote in her December 17 opinion.

And I agree with that. However, priorities. As to TJ’s point below, if a cop stands on a street corner and observes what is going on in the community, is he spying? If he stops a specific person who is acting suspiciously yet not at that moment committing a crime, is that an intrusion on their privacy? I presume there are some rules as to what a cop can/should interfere. This is subject is probably more relevant in big city areas where cops are more likely to walk a beat as opposed to the drive-by most of us get.

Also, TJ, I agree that you’re not arguing that it’s your biggest worry, but in the context of the other things going on, like what I posted above, where is the outrage? Not you, specifically, but in the general paranoia-based community?

Nor are many of them ever likely to. For a significant number it was like a religious experience. Once they went all-in, they pretty much became lifers. Did you see Baba Wawa’s recent comments in regard to The Messiah (PBUH)?

The biggest worry should be the unsustainable fiscal path we are on. It is like we are on the Titanic heading for the iceberg and the Captain has decided not to even try to steer away from it because the passengers might panic.

“Almost Orwellian”—that’s the description a federal judge gave earlier this week to the massive spying by the National Security Agency (NSA) on virtually all 380 million cellphones in the United States.

In the first meaningful and jurisdictionally grounded judicial review of the NSA cellphone spying program, U.S. District Court Judge Richard Leon, a George W. Bush appointee sitting in Washington, D.C., ruled that the scheme of asking a secret judge on a secret court for a general warrant to spy on all American cellphone users without providing evidence of probable cause of criminal behavior against any of them is unconstitutional because it directly violates the Fourth Amendment.

Readers of this page are familiar with the purpose of that Amendment and the requirements it imposes on the government. The Framers intended it to prevent the new government in America from doing to Americans what the British government had done to the colonists under the king.

The British government had used general warrants—which are not based on individualized probable cause and do not name the place to be searched or the person or thing to be seized — to authorize British soldiers to search the colonists wherever they pleased for whatever they wished to seize. The reason for the Fourth Amendment requirement of individualized probable cause and specificity in the warrant is to prevent the very type of general warrant that the NSA has claimed is lawful. The reason for preventing general warrants is that they have become an instrument of tyranny.

I suppose my basic point is I object to the language being used. I don’t consider it spying if a computer program analyzes information without having any “knowledge” or conscious power to do anything with that information. Now there is a great fuzzy area at what point a “hit” is found and how the request for a warrant is justified and requested. I agree these are areas of concern, but the hyperbole that “the government is listening in on EVERYBODY’s phone calls” does not do the discussion justice and is a distraction from the real issue. And due to the significant noise to signal ratio along with the political turgidity (as polite a word as I could find) I don’t see much point in spending much time on it. People need to settle down and focus on the real issue at hand. This is not a black-and-white situation. It certainly would make for an interesting philosophical discussion. Know any place where a man could find such?

I might also note, and always wanted to ask a lawyer or law enforcement person this, about a similar fuzzy area of law. When a fugitive appears at the home of a close relative, how much time passes before the relative is guilty of “harboring” such? If your wayward son appears on your doorstep at 2 AM, must you notify the police before sunrise? Does anyone see similar parallels here or am I out on a limb?

WTP, let’s say I believe that an employee or group of employees inside the NSA decided to help Obama’s re-election by listening in to all of the Romney campaign communications and sending this intelligence to the Obama campaign.

Heard the same argument when Bush originally started the program. It’s like Magus says above, the NSA is dangerous in evil hands–just like a gun. We should jail those who use the gun improperly, not get rid of the gun.

I don’t like the idea of limiting freedom to use a tool, even the government’s freedom, based on the possibility that someone could misuse that tool. There is nothing to stop a cop from knocking down your door in the middle of the night without a warrant. But does that mean the police shouldn’t have battering rams?

Every day this government threatens and harasses individuals and private corporations using far more overt measures. For the last couple of years I have been prohibited from purchasing the home owners’ insurance coverage that I would like from the company I would like to purchase it from because a REPUBLICAN (well, not no longer) governor and similar legislature (though with all-in support of the Dems and only partial GOP) decided that it costs too much. Not that the company was insolvent in any way. Sh*t like this affects our daily lives. The NSA, not so much.

The conclusion I draw is our security clearance apparatus is flawed relative to the population we have. It’s slim pickings out there trying to find people who:

1) want to work in a very security-oriented environment
2) have the skills desired for working in such an environment
3) (lastly and most importantly) are trustworthy

At base, and I’ll admit this is a bit of a cop-out, this is a society problem. Too many people with too many problems, even putting the idiotic drug prohibition overhead aside. Also, our security check processes are overwhelmed both by the volume of jobs that require clearances and the work involved (or I should say, should be involved) in clearing such people. I am quite sure only spot-checking is being done for anything less than TS. Part of this problem is due to many programs requiring greater clearances than is necessary, combined with post-9/11 BS where agencies such as the TSA and FBI cannot accept a DoD Secret clearance as completely adequate anymore, so each has its own bureaucracy duplicate part of the job. This isn’t a specific risk but it taxes resources that would best be applied elsewhere.

A Department of Energy network breach earlier this year that allowed hackers to download sensitive personal information for 104,000 people was the result of a decade-old patchwork of systems, some that hadn’t installed critical security updates in years, according to a federal watchdog.

July’s successful hack on the department’s Employee Data Repository database was at least the third one to occur since 2011, DOE Inspector General Gregory H. Friedman wrote in a recently published review of the breach. The hack resulted in the exfiltration of more than 104,000 individuals’ personally identifiable information (PII), including their social security numbers, bank account data, dates and places of birth, user names, and answers to security questions. The department expects to incur costs of $3.7 million setting up credit monitoring and in lost productivity. That figure doesn’t include the costs of fixing the vulnerable systems.

The inspector general review recited a litany of failures that allowed hackers to penetrate system defenses. Chief among them is the fact that none of the 354 database tables containing social security numbers were encrypted. Using strong cryptography to protect such “at rest” PII has long been considered a best practice in government and corporate data security. The department’s management information system (MIS) that allowed access to the DOEInfo databases also failed to require common security enhancements, such as two-factor authentication or a department-issued virtual private network.

TJ, you’ll be dismayed to note that the trend our society is taking is magnified twn-fold in the military. Historically, radicals have always used the military to change society, and not only through force of arms.

In the interest of being fair and balanced, here’s a Republican at work:

Joe drives to Obama’s house, which is located in a very nice neighborhood and where it’s clear that all the residents make more than $250,000 per year.

Joe arrives and takes his tools into the house. Joe is led to the room that contains the leaky pipe under a sink. Joe assesses the problem and tells Obama, who is standing near the door, that it’s an easy repair that will take less than 10 minutes.

Obama asks Joe how much it will cost. Joe immediately says, “$9,500.”

“$9,500?” Obama asks, stunned, “But you said it’s an easy repair!”

“Yes, but what I do is charge a lot more to my clients who make more than $250,000 per year so I can fix the plumbing of everybody who makes less than that for free,” explains Joe. “It’s always been my philosophy. As a matter of fact, I lobbied government to pass this philosophy as law, and it did pass earlier this year, so now all plumbers have to do business this way. It’s known as ‘Joe’s Fair Plumbing Act of 2009.’ Surprised you haven’t heard of it.”

In spite of that, Obama tells Joe there’s no way he’s paying that much for a small plumbing repair, so Joe leaves. Obama spends the next hour flipping through the phone book looking for another plumber, but he finds that all other plumbing businesses listed have gone out of business. Not wanting to pay Joe’s price, Obama does nothing. The leak under Obama’s sink goes unrepaired for the next several days.

A week later the leak is so bad that Obama has had to put a bucket under the sink. The bucket fills up quickly and has to be emptied every hour, and there’s a risk that the room will flood, so Obama calls Joe and pleads with him to return. Joe goes back to Obama’s house, looks at the leaky pipe, and says, “Let’s see – this will cost you about $21,000.”

“A few days ago you told me it would cost $9,500!” Obama quickly fires back.

Joe explains the reason for the dramatic increase. “Well, because of the ‘Joe’s Fair Plumbing Act,’ a lot of rich people are learning how to fix their own plumbing, so there are fewer of you paying for all the free plumbing I’m doing for the people who make less than $250,000. As a result, the rate I have to charge my wealthy paying customers rises every day.

“Not only that, but for some reason the demand for plumbing work from the group of people who get it for free has skyrocketed, and there’s a long waiting list of those who need repairs. This has put a lot of my fellow plumbers out of business, and they’re not being replaced – nobody is going into the plumbing business because they know they won’t make any money. I’m hurting now too – all thanks to greedy rich people like you who won’t pay their fair share.”

Obama tries to straighten out the plumber: “Of course you’re hurting, Joe! Don’t you get it? If all the rich people learn how to fix their own plumbing and you refuse to charge the poorer people for your services, you’ll be broke, and then what will you do?”

Robertson has been suspended from Duck Dynasty due to comments he made to GQ that have been deemed “anti-gay.” According to Paglia, the culture has become too politically correct.

“To express yourself in a magazine in an interview — this is the level of punitive PC, utterly fascist, utterly Stalinist, OK, that my liberal colleagues in the Democratic Party and on college campuses have supported and promoted over the last several decades,” Paglia said. “This is the whole legacy of free speech 1960’s that have been lost by my own party.”

Paglia went on to point out that while she is an atheist she respects religion and has been frustrated by the intolerance of gay activists.

“I think that this intolerance by gay activists toward the full spectrum of human beliefs is a sign of immaturity, juvenility,” Paglia said. “This is not the mark of a true intellectual life. This is why there is no cultural life now in the U.S. Why nothing is of interest coming from the major media in terms of cultural criticism. Why the graduates of the Ivy League with their A, A, A+ grades are complete cultural illiterates, etc. is because they are not being educated in any way to give respect to opposing view points.”

“There is a dialogue going on human civilization, for heaven sakes. It’s not just this monologue coming from fanatics who have displaced the religious beliefs of their parents into a political movement,” she added. “And that is what happened to feminism, and that is what happened to gay activism, a fanaticism.”

You guys probably think I rant about gays a lot. This is exactly why. It has nothing to do with me wanting to control their behavior. It has everything to do with them being a chosen demograph of the Left, which means they will try to control me. They will mercilessly reach for power. They will crush everyone that does not toe their line. They are, for the most part, Leftists, which means to me they’re anti-American.

There are those who do grab onto victimization issues in order to use them as tools in politics. They speak of wars against X and persecution, while lashing out.

But, most folks are too busy doing their own stuff to do that. I’m reasonable confident that most of the gays have no interest in what you do or desire to control you. But, maybe I am wrong. We’d need some input from the Gay Illuminati on this.

This story that just won’t die, mostly because the media loves it, is the problem with conservatism. Whenever conservatism gets any traction on the policies that conservatism, by its very meaning, should concern itself with, the media and the dems know they can count on waving some social “conservative” issues in their faces and they will abandon all previously supposed “principles” and go after that red meat every time. It’s definitely a sign of our times that this grey-beard foul mouthed bigoted douche bag who at one time abandoned his family for drink and who knows what else would become some sort of representative of the conservative cause. You’ll notice that obummer, who couldn’t seem to keep his nose out of every local social, race, etc. issue is quiet on this one. Oh, I’m sure that db wants to jump all over it, but someone (James Carvelle, I presume) is emphasizing the political maxim of never get in your enemy’s way when he’s destroying himself.

Geez, wtp, who EVER would have guessed that a Christian evangelical would think being gay is a sin? Ripping on him for his problem with alcohol–back in the 1970s–seems a bit much. If the American population falls for this red meat we deserve what the liberals are bringing us. Was he supposed to lie about his thoughts in the interview? Or he supposed to see the liberal light and join in the gay orgy?

Oh that’s only a drop in the bucket in regard to this idiotic posturing crap. A&E plays coy with the “gee, we had no idea” angle and deserves far more abuse than it has taken on this issue as well.

Look, I don’t object to the guy expressing his opinion that he believe’s homosexuality is a sin. I object a little to the way he expresses it and a whole lot to the passive-aggressive victimization angle he and many of his supporters take. Yet a the same time denying doing the same. The reasoning is much like the sort of passive-aggressive crap that Mike puts up here. And there’s a difference between “having a problem with alcohol” and abandoning your family, kicking your wife and kids out of the house, committing crimes and disappearing into the woods. Such a person, should they recover, would do well to show a significant amount of humility the rest of their life. And not the preachy kind. In my experience, such people are not to be trusted. The preachy kind, I mean, not those who turn their lives around and show a significant degree of humility.

While it is sometimes wrong to judge a book by its cover, such is a cliche that I find quite wanting itself. Of the many subcultures (sorry, can’t find the proper word for it) from Goths to Bikers to Metrosexuals to Greybeards, I find the greybeards to deviate the least from their group. Oh, they might have different politics, religions, or whatevs but they pretty much all boil down to a whiny yet preachy p/a personality. Any problem they encounter in life is manifested as an attack on their “honor” or their “down-to-earthiness”. Learned much of this from playing pool with a number of them but also from couple I’ve known personally. A former brother-in-law was one. Used to quote the Bible when it suited him but he was a good distance from honorable. I know the thought pattern, seen the meme repeated many times over.

As for your request, I would not find you foul mouth and bigoted. While we only know each other through this and your blog, I would be mighty surprised if you were to expound on the pleasures of a woman’s vagina being preferable to a man’s anus. Such a vulgarity shows a considerable lack of class and character. It’s locker room talk that would turn heads in many locker rooms. Gave me the creeps to even type it out and I’m quite far from prudish. I do not find it bigoted to view homosexuality as a sin. I disagree that it is such, but it is not bigoted to express one’s opinion. The manner some people express their opinions does reveal something about their character, however. Guilty as charged, I suppose. And to be clear, I do not agree with the degree of anti-Phil crap that is out there either. As I said, there is much hypocrisy to go around on this issue.

Give Phil Robertson a chance, he may not be who you think he is. He admits all the wrongs he did. He tries to show people that even someone as bad as he was had hope, and it wasn’t a government program.

OK, so found time to watch the video. I wish I could say I learned something new, but it was nothing I haven’t seen time and time again. Let me give you an idea of where I’m coming from. I went to public school for elementary and high school, but attended a fundamentalist Presbyterian school for my middle school years. We were a family that went to church every Sunday and had pretty much a live-and-let-live attitude. Homosexuality, while considered a sin and wrong, just wasn’t much of a subject in our house. Nor many of the other “sins”. Responsibility overrode all else. At this parochial school, now we were 11-12-13-14 year olds mind you, at certain times like chapel and bible class, we were encouraged to tell our stories of being “saved”. It seemed like every one of my middle and upper-middle class classmates had a story about how they were on the road to perdition but had some sort of divine intervention in their lives and how Jesus saved them from horrible moral corruption. Granted, this was south Florida in the drug hey-days but I knew these kids from 6th grade on so their “bad times” would have had to occur before I knew them. Adults encouraged this and never was anyone questioned. I specifically remember looking around a room of 25 or 30 students and how many of them did NOT have such a story to tell. I’d like to say I counted 5 but I can only recall 3 of us and that includes myself. In high school drugs were quite available. It was here that I encountered such stories as those related above that actually were for real. So many kids got messed up on drugs and alcohol. They were generally the type where everything was about them. Annoying bastards. My friends and I drank and smoked the occasional weed. But nothing to the excess of such braggarts. Then these druggies, as we called them, would one by one get religion. The joke was “I used to be f’d up on drugs and alcohol and now I’m f’d up on Jesus Christ”. While they were now no longer a threat to society, they were just as annoying as ever.

Some of what grates in this video are things like how a man could get to college, etc. yet claim he “didn’t know anything about Jesus” and such. Living in 1950’s south? Even if his parents never went to church, etc. he had to go to school somewhere. I’m almost certain they had prayer in his school. Hell, they lived in a “parish”. I don’t mean to judge but this stuff is just BS. I don’t trust people to BS in the name of Jesus.

Then there’s the stuff about “the law got after me” and “that’s the devil in him”. Classic responsibility dodges I’ve heard from recidivists many times.

I guess what it boils down to is that I was raised to do what is expected of me in life all the time. Yes, there are wild oats to be sowed when young, but use your head. And if you f up your life but manage to recover, show some humility. Don’t go preaching how to live to people who had the goddam common decency to behave themselves while you were off making misery. “Good ole country folks from Louisiana”…who crave attention.

And again, A&E is full of BS with their story, etc. I was never a Paula Dean fan, found her quite annoying, but where was all this outrage over companies dropping her products over something she said far more innocently many, many years ago? Is it because she’s (supposedly, I wouldn’t know) a Democrat? Then it’s nothing but politics. Hell, when I got kept after “diversity training” class and lectured by an ignorant woman in front of my coworkers (who I might add knew far less about the subject than I did) many years ago after simply rolling my eyes too many times, it was understood that if you didn’t like such you didn’t have to work there. BS of course, but there’s nothing new about this sh*t. There have been plenty of opportunities in the past to address this issue with far more respectable people. The DD folks are just playing into the hands of the media and the left who need a distraction from Obummers numerous miserable failures.

To clarify, the who I might add knew far less about the subject than I did applies to the lady teaching the class, not my coworkers. We were an already diversified staff of Americans (black and white), Indians, Chinese, Pakistanis, Vietnamese, Jamaicans, yadda-yadda-yadda.

There are plenty of Christians walking around who people just think are “nice” people but have to real idea they’re practicing Christians. As for the types that preach to people who are able to do right without religion, this very issue was brought to the attention of Jesus by the pharisees, that Jesus was hanging out with sinners instead of people considered righteous. Jesus’ reply was that it was the sick who needed doctors. I myself have written that people who maintain themselves without a spiritual source are stronger than me, I admit this. On the other hand, I beleive my beliefs make me stronger than the average person who doesn’t consider these things at all. Paul exorts all Christians to have a “sober” mind. To me, this means being able to communicate to people why you believe what you do, that means science, philosophy history, the whole thing. It’s not just about “getting saved.” People in the modern world will usually not respond to that sort of talk, because it sounds stupid to them. Of course, Paul says such talk will sound foolish to many people. So I don’t do it. Above all, it’s important to remain humble. Paul admitted he was nothing.

The people at the Ivy League schools don’t talk to me, so I cannot say what they are up to.

In my classes, I present various historical and current views in part so students can get a picture of how there are many different view points that can be defended rationally. I also stress that views should be given the respect they are due. But, I do argue that not all opinions are equally good. Some are crap and calling crap crap does respect the crap.

To help students see matters from different perspectives, my Ethics paper requires the student to argue at length for their position on a moral issue. The student then has to present a substantial objection against their view and then reply back to it with a developed argument.

I do-propaganda, the tendency of people to put far too much weight on the negative, media coverage creates the spotlight effect, plus the odd pleasure people often feel at seeing themselves as persecuted victims.

It is an extremely irrational belief-Christmas is the dominant holiday and almost everyone likes it. Heck, even non-Christans are into it. I’d say that Christmas won America. Saying there is a war on Christmas is like saying there is a war on sports or TV.

“It is an extremely irrational belief-Christmas is the dominant holiday and almost everyone likes it.”

That has nothing to do with whether there is a war of Christmas. Cultural Marxims targets cultural hegemony. Standard Gramsci theory. Mike does not understand that Marxist theory changed when the Frankfurt School folks moved from Germany to New York and took root at Columbia University. Economic determinism is no longer the focus: Culture is.

Christmas is bad.
Classic family is bad.
Classic sexual norms are bad.
White people are bad.
Men are bad.

I think the “war on Christmas” needs to seen in the broader context of the “war on traditional values.”

Also, while I agree that everybody loves Christmas trees, presents, and even Christmas music, not everybody is happy if too much “Christ” gets put in Christmas or too much “holy” is put into the holidays.

Interesting philosophical question there, TJ. Can a teacher teach that which he does not fundamentally understand himself, possibly due to a certain lack of self-awareness? I learn a lot from my dog, yet his prospects of attaining tenure are quite slim.

Every month, it seems, brings a new story of this presidency leveling the intimidating powers of the federal government against some law-abiding citizen. Now comes a terrifying tale of how the Federal Trade Commission, a governmental Goliath, crushes an average David—because it can.

In March of this year, a small nonprofit in Cincinnati—the Music Teachers National Association—received a letter from the FTC. The agency was investigating whether the association was engaged in, uh, anticompetitive practices.

A health insurance provider is sending 20-something activists out on the streets of Denver in their underwear to persuade young people to ‘get covered.’
The resulting photos and video footage, which the organization published on Instagram this week, has a protest flavor that comes complete with a Twitter hashtag: #getcoveredCO.
And U.S. taxpayers are footing the bill for the risque street performances through a federal government loan.

Yup. The enemy. And I’m tired of identifying them otherwise. The choice is between victory and destruction, not war and peace. Pacifism hands control to those who are not pacifists. They’re not pacifists, so neither am I.

Interesting. Can’t remember the exact nature of the other time this happened, but we discussed that every so often one notices a phenomenon and talks or writes about it, only to find later that there is an actual term for it. In this case, I have written in the past on my observation that our government has turned into a strange monster which violates all the rules a good government should follow, that is it fails to adequately punish criminals and exterior enemies and targets law abiding citizens because they are easy targets.

World Still Lost In Un-Real Abstractionism–We’re Up Against Satanism, Nothing Less

Actually, the best term is SATANISM, the culture of DEATH, built upon the culture of lies.

It’s not not not not not “left” vs. “right,” both of these controlled by the topmost Satanist powers (behind the US Federal Reserve Bank COUNTERFEIT scam), both sides of this false paradigm pushing “good-evil” moralism/Pharisaism.

Note then destruction of TRUTH is effected by the fallacious/delusionary “good-evil” of Kant an Plato, lately by Leo Strauss (the “noble lie”).

See, what absolutely RULES for this society, including now for all the world?–LIES, the primary weapon being US Fed COUNTERFEITING scam (literally–it’s just legalized by vote of paid-off politicians). See RealityZone.com and Mises.org for definitive expo on Fed.

Thus when u control the money-supply, U RULE, period–and these criminals are determined to maintain their grip. Hence Fed powers fund all the terrorism, keeping the suckers and morons afraid and willing to give-up their rights, the stupid fools. And now we have AGENDA-21 “de-population” GENOCIDE as official program for world gov.

People gotta get a clue–TO SAVING THEIR VERY LIVES–it’s Satanism, nothing else or less, on the march, and the purpose is genocide by all the various means.

“Anarcho-tyranny”?–this is far toooooooooooooo abstracted–get real, get practical–it’s Satanism, literally, just as I analyze, above.

Not sure if this qualifies as Democrats at “Work” buuuuut…
Students at PS 106 in Far Rockaway, Queens, have gotten no math or reading and writing books for the rigorous Common Core curriculum, whistleblowers say.
The 234 kids get no gym or art classes. Instead, they watch movies every day.
“The kids have seen more movies than Siskel and Ebert,” a source said.
The school nurse has no office equipped with a sink, refrigerator or cot.
The library is a mess: “Nothing’s in order,” said a source. “It’s a junk room.”
No substitutes are hired when a teacher is absent — students are divvied up among other classes.
A classroom that includes learning-disabled kids doesn’t have the required special-ed co-teacher.
About 40 kindergartners have no room in the three-story brick building. They sit all day in dilapidated trailers that reek of “animal urine,” a parent said; rats and squirrels noisily scamper in the walls and ceiling.

NO GYM OR ART: With no phys-ed or art classes, students are left to watch movies, including “Alvin and the Chipmunks” and “Fat Albert.”

NO SPACE: Without enough space in the main brick building, kindergartners are taught in what sources say are rat-infested trailers.

Principal Marcella Sills is a frequent no-show; The Post found she missed every day of school last week but one.

And the principal — Marcella Sills, who joined PS 106 nine years ago — is a frequent no-show, sources say.
Sills did not come to school last Monday. On Tuesday, she showed up at 3:30 p.m.
On Wednesday, The Post found her at home in Westbury, LI, all day before emerging at 2:50 p.m. — school dismissal time. Wearing a fur coat, she took her BMW for a spin.
She showed up at school Thursday, but not Friday.
When Sills, 48, does go to work, it’s rarely before 11 a.m. — and often hours later, say sources familiar with her schedule.
“She strolls in whenever she wants,” one said.
The school hasn’t had a payroll secretary in years.
A Department of Education spokesman said Sills was required to report her absences and tardiness to District 27 Superintendent Michelle Lloyd-Bey but would not say whether Sills did so last week.
Lloyd-Bey did not return a call. Sills hung up on a reporter.
When she is out, an assistant principal is left in charge. Yet Sills, who gets a $128,207 salary, also pockets overtime pay — $2,900 for 83 hours in 2011, the latest available records show.
“This school is a complete s- -thole, but nobody in a position of power comes to investigate. No one cares,” a community member said.

With French unemployment officially at over 10.5%, unofficially probably higher, Hollande put on his clothes, slunk out of his latest female friend’s apartment and stood before the national enquiring minds of not only the French press but the international media as well, plaintively asking:
“How can we run a country if entrepreneurs don’t hire?” he said. “And how can we redistribute if there’s no wealth?”